The power of identity

Author(s)

• Castells, Manuel

Bibliographic Information

The power of identity

Manuel Castells

（The information age : economy, society and culture, v. 2）

Blackwell, 1997

• : hbk
• : pbk

Note

Bibliography: p. [397]-434

Includes index

Description and Table of Contents

Volume

: hbk ISBN 9781557868732

Description

This is an account of the two great and conflicting trends now shaping the world: globalization and identity. The information technology revolution and the restructuring of capitalism have induced the network society, and ushered in the globalization of strategic economic activities, flexibility and instability of work, and a culture of real virtuality. But, alongside the transformation of capitalism and the demise of statism, there has been a powerful surge of expressions of collective identity. These challenge globalization on behalf of cultural singularity and control over life and environment. The book describes the origins, purpose and effect of proactive movements, such as feminism and environmentalism, which aim to transform human relationships at their most fundamental level; and of reactive movements that build trenches of resistance on behalf of God, nation, ethnicity, family or locality. The fundamental categories of existence, the author shows, are threatened by the combined, contradictory assault of techno-economic forces and transformative social movements, each using the new power of the media to promote their ambitions. Caught between these opposing trends, he argues, the nation-state is called into question, drawing into its crisis the very notion of political democracy. The author moves thematically between the United States, Western Europe, Russia, Mexico, Bolivia, the Islamic World, China and Japan, seeking to understand a variety of social processes that are, he contends, closely inter-related in function and meaning.

Table of Contents

• Prolegmena
• communal heavens
• identity and meaning in the network society
• the other face of the Earth - social movements against the global disorder
• the end of patriarchalism - social movements, family and sexuality in the information age
• a powerless state?
• informational politics and the crisis of democracy
• conclusion - social change in the network society.

Volume

: pbk ISBN 9781557868749

Description

This is an account of the two great and conflicting trends now shaping the world: globalization and identity. The information technology revolution and the restructuring of capitalism have induced the network society, and ushered in the globalization of strategic economic activities, flexibility and instability of work, and a culture of real virtuality. But alongside the transformation of capitalism and the demise of statism there has been a powerful surge of expressions of collective identity. These challenge globalization on behalf of cultural singularity and control over life and environment. Manuel Castells describes the origins, purpose, and effect of proactive movements, such as feminism and environmentalism, which aim to transform human relationships at their most fundamental level: and of reactive movements that build trenches of resistance on behalf of God, nation, ethnicity, family, or locality. The fundamental categories of existence, the author shows, are threatened by the combined, contradictory assault of techno-economic forces and transformative social movements, each using the new power of the media to promote their ambitions. Caught between these opposing trends, he argues, the nation-state is called into question, drawing into its crisis the very notion of political democracy. The author moves thematically between the United States, Western Europe, Russia, Mexico, Bolivia, the Islamic World, China and Japan, seeking to understand a variety of social processes that are, he contends, closely inter-related in function and meaning. This is a book of profound importance for understanding how the world will have been transformed by the beginning of the next century.

Table of Contents

List of Figures. List of Tables. List of Charts. Acknowledgments. Our World, our Lives. Part I: Communal Heavens: Identity and Meaning in the Network Society: The Construction of Identity. God's Heavens: Religious Fundamentalism and Cultural Identity. Nations and Nationalisms in the Age of Globalization: Imagined Communities or Communal Images? Ethnic Unbonding: Race, Class, and Identity in the Network Society. Territorial Identities: the Local Community. Conclusion: the Cultural Communes of the Information Age. Part II: The Other Face of the Earth: Social Movements against the New Global Order: Globalization, Informationalization, and Social Movements. Mexico's Zapatistas: the First Informational Guerrilla Movement. Up in Arms against the New World Order: the American Militia and the Patriot Movement in the 1990s. The Lamas of Apocalypse: Japan's Aum Shinrikyo. The Meaning of Insurgencies against the New Global Order. Conclusion. Part III: The Greening of the Self: the Environmental Movement: The Creative Cacophony of Environmentalism: a Typology. The Meaning of Greening: Social Issues and the Ecologists' Challenge. Environmentalism in Action: Reaching Minds, Taming Capital, Courting the State, Tap-dancing with the Media. Environmental Justice: Ecologists' New Frontier. Part IV: The End of Patriarchalism: Social Movements, Family, and Sexuality in the Information Age: The Crisis of the Patriarchal Family. Women at Work. Sisterhood is Powerful: the Feminist Movement. The Power of Love: Lesbian and Gay Liberation Movements. Family, Sexuality, and Personality in the Crisis of Patriarchalism. The End of Patriarchalism? Part V: A Powerless State? : Globalization and the State. The Nation-state in the Age of Multilateralism. Global Governance and the Super Nation-state. Identities, Local Governments, and the Deconstruction of the Nation-state. The Identification of the State. Contemporary Crises of Nation-states: Mexico's PRI State and the US Federal Government in the 1990s. The State, Violence, and Surveillance: from Big Brother to Little Sisters. The Crisis of the Nation-state and the Theory of the State. Conclusion: the King of the Universe, Sun Tzu, and the Crisis of Democracy. Part VI: Informational Politics and the Crisis of Democracy: Introduction: the Politics of Society. Media as the Space of Politics in the Information Age. Informational Politics in Action: the Politics of Scandal. The Crisis of Democracy. Conclusion: Reconstructing Democracy? Conclusion: Social Change in the Network Society. Methodological Appendix. Summary of Contents of Volumes I and III. References. Index.

by "Nielsen BookData"

Details

• NCID: BA31148360
• ISBN:
  • 1557868735
  • 1557868743
• LCCN: 96036317
• Country Code: us
• Title Language Code: eng
• Text Language Code: eng
• Place of Publication: Malden, Mass.
• Pages/Volumes: xv, 461 p.
• Size: 23 cm
• Classification:
  • NDC9 : 361.45
  • NDC8 : 361.45
  • LCC : HM221
  • DC20 : 303.48/33
• Subject Headings:
  • LCSH : Information society
  • LCSH : Social movements
  • LCSH : Information technology -- Social aspects
  • LCSH : Information technology -- Political aspects
  • LCSH : Identity
• Parent Bibliography ID:
  • BA28557124